“What happened?” Hannah asked, finally noticing the tears streaming down Julian’s face.

  “I… Harvey,” Julian stuttered.

  “The leader almost got me,” Harvey interrupted. “Apparently, Sarah was his sister, and the big one blindsided me after I crushed her into the ground. Before I knew what hit me, I was face-first in the dirt. Then he kicked off my helmet and was about to put a flaming sword through my neck when Julian saved me.”

  She looked down at him with a somber expression before dismounting Buttercup and helping him to his feet. Julian stayed kneeling, struggling to catch his breath as he brought his raging emotions back under control.

  “That was too close,” Julian sniffled. “I was so focused on finishing the first skeleton that I ignored the leader disengaging.”

  “It’s ok, Julian. Really,” Harvey urged. “It’s not your job to save me.”

  “Yes, it is! I’m the Born Protector. The Emberheart Vanguard. Everything I’ve done here has all been to make sure I can keep myself and my friends alive until we finally get back home. Caring more about killing that skeleton than protecting you almost got you killed!” Julian shouted.

  “But it didn’t,” Hannah interrupted. “He’s alive! That’s what matters!”

  “Exactly,” Harvey added. “The skeletons are dead, and I’m still here, all thanks to you.”

  “That’s not true,” Julian rejected. “Your arc charges let me take out the first one before the others could help, and you killed the ice mage all by yourself.”

  “Ok, fine, I helped, but I was also fighting tired and relying on potions to keep me going. Normally, I would’ve held back, but I was confident knowing you were there to back me up if things went wrong,” Harvey admitted.

  “We all have our roles to play if we’re going to make it out alive, and I can’t afford to lose sight of mine again. Hannah’s the hunter blowing up the big guys. You’re the tactician creating the conditions where we actually have a chance to win,” he asserted. “Me? I’m the shield. I hold the line so the rest of you can focus on killing those undead bastards.”

  “Nobody expects you to do that alone,” Harvey replied.

  “I do! I’m the god damn Defender of Veils End,” he snapped, tearing off his gauntlet and pointing to the Mark depicting a stone tower tattooed on the back of his hand. “That means something to me. From now on, if the Undead want to get anywhere near you, they’ll have to get through me.”

  A brilliant light burst from Julian’s right arm, shining through the steel like it wasn’t even there. It continued for over 30 seconds, and Harvey could tell Julian was fighting back searing pain. When it finally abated, Julian removed his armor and peeled back his clothes to reveal a new tattoo on his forearm.

  The Born Protector mark was gone, replaced by an intricate depiction of Julian clad in steel, shield raised high. Golden fire poured from its face, forming an unbroken barrier around a sea of faceless figures standing behind him.

  “Is that?” Hannah asked.

  “An Imprint,” Harvey interrupted.

  A screen appeared in front of him, and they all gathered to read it.

  Something new filled Julian’s aura, making Harvey a silent promise that he was safe. Harvey had always felt more confident around Julian ever since he first got the Born Protector Mark, but what used to be a helping hand was now an ironclad promise.

  “It’s like I’m reading your biography,” Harvey smiled.

  “Yep, the System really nailed it,” Hannah added.

  “Of course it did. This is my legacy, not my hopes and dreams,” Julian smiled.

  “Is it really that easy? Just say this is who I am now, and the System gives you a boost?” Hannah complained.

  “What? No,” Harvey laughed.

  “Well then, how does it work? What do I need to do to finally get my own Mark?” Hannah groaned.

  “Follow your path,” Julian replied.

  “Oh, like that’s so easy to do. I’m 21! How am I supposed to know what my path is?” Hannah exclaimed.

  “I don’t think you’re supposed to know by your age,” Harvey said. “Hell, I don’t think I should be deciding what my Legacy is going to be at 25 years old.”

  “Easy for you to say! Whether you think you’re ready to choose your Legacy or not, you’ve already got your Mark. You both get bonus stats and aura effects, and I get nothing,” Hannah complained.

  “Oh come on, 15 bonus stats from a Mark isn’t worth getting stuck doing the wrong things for the rest of your life,” Julian said.

  “Maybe. Maybe not! But a 25% increase to my stats would be pretty helpful right about now!” She yelled. “I just… I’m just worried about falling behind.”

  Stolen story; please report.

  “Hannah, I want you to listen to me. You have all the time in the world. I’m going to make sure of that. Now that we know what we’re up against,” Julian said, pointing to the dead skeletons still leaking aquamarine mist. “I’m confident we’ll make it to the other side of this thing.”

  She appeared to struggle for a moment, words itching to explode from her mouth, before Harvey saw her muscles relax.

  “Fine,” she muttered.

  “I really don’t think it’s got anything to do with you,” Harvey assured. “Julian was already living his Mark before the System as a firefighter, and I lived mine creating things in the tech world. With how you treat Buttercup, I’m sure there’s a Mark coming right around the corner for you. Just needs some more time.”

  “Thanks, guys… and congrats, Julian. Sorry, I didn’t mean to steal your moment like that,” she trailed.

  “Don’t worry about it,” Julian cheered. “Now let’s take care of these bodies.”

  Harvey finally took a moment to breathe. Adrenaline was still trying to hijack his nervous system, but his heart rate was slowly coming back down. Julian’s promise helped a lot, especially considering the System believed him enough to codify it as an Imprint.

  How lucky am I to have friends like these?

  The image of the black sword hovering just above his throat kept trying to invade his mind, but he distracted himself by moving towards the body of the mage. Opening the kill notification that was patiently waiting for him, he learned that Sarah had been a Level 41 Ossari. He had no idea whether that was her Race level or her Class, but it explained how strong she’d been. Without his arc charges and opening with his strongest attack before she could coat him in her debilitating ice, he would’ve been hard-pressed to kill her.

  Do skeletons have professions? Would being a missionary for the Undying Prophet count?

  The once vibrantly teal marrow in her bones had darkened considerably, and he could feel the essence leaking from it like a burst pipe. Trying to figure out how these skeletons managed to walk, talk, swing swords, and use magic without any flesh and blood was beyond his current understanding, but he assumed cracking through the bone was like opening a bleeding wound. Inspecting the bones, he didn’t see any signs of the array patterns on the Graveweaver constructs, suggesting they really were living beings.

  Unliving?

  The essence leaking from the marrow was rootless and inert, but he was interested to see a black metal band around the Ossari’s neck still churning out mist. Touching the mist didn’t burn or rot his fingers, but he did begin to feel a bit queasy. He could feel his weave trying to drink the mist in to replenish his spent essence, and had to condense his aura around his hand to prevent the energy from entering his body. The band was clasped at the back, and after some fumbling, he managed to remove it from her neck. Embedded in the center was a perfectly smooth crystal, looking like a refined version of the resonance crystal he’d found inside the Graveweaver’s skulls. Considering the mist coming from each of the Ossari corpses, he assumed they all wore a similar collar.

  Even after being removed from her body, the mist didn’t stop. Luckily, it didn’t smell, so his nose was spared from rotting necroses while he inspected the arrays covering its surface.

  Can I turn it off? He wondered. He tried inserting his will into the collar, only to feel a fierce repulsion to his living essence. The collar railed against his mind like he was trying to break it down inside his inkwell, aiming to stab a needle of undeath into his soul.

  “Don’t mess with the collars!” He shouted. “They fight back, but I have the Willpower to resist them.”

  Unable to interact with the arrays, he tried inspecting it with Artificer’s Eyes.

  Harvey’s mind raced to find a way to use the resonance crystal or the strange metal band for inscriptions of his own, but he decided it was better to test if they could destroy the conduits. Placing the collar on a rock, he took a tentative swing with Aftershock. When nothing happened, he swung harder. Julian and Hannah gave him concerned looks, but didn’t interfere as he slowly warped the metal. Even after being bent into scrap metal, the array continued spewing thanum. The volume of deathly smoke had definitely decreased, but not stopped completely.

  Harvey avoided the resonance crystal as best he could, not wanting an undeath-flavored version of a destroyed essence crystal’s light invading his mind. It wasn’t until he cut halfway through the thick collar that the array finally broke. Finally able to inspect the ink without getting a face full of death, he realized the ink making up the array had been drunk deep into the metal. Looking at his own hammer, he realized his arrays must have done the same. Otherwise, a single dent in the burst array’s ink would break it altogether.

  “What is it?” Julian asked.

  “A collar that converts essence into thanum. I’m guessing that’s what they call the mist,” Harvey answered.

  “Explains why they were wearing those robes over their armor,” Julian said. “They probably need that thanum stuff to survive.”

  “It’s pretty ingenious, actually, using arrays to convert hostile energy into essence that resonates with your race,” Harvey said.

  “Maybe we can do the same with some sort of superlife mist around our army? That way, they get weaker trying to fight us,” she suggested.

  “Superlife?” Harvey laughed.

  “I don’t know,” she chuckled. “I’d like to see you come up with a better name for it.”

  Harvey broke the rest of the collars one by one, saving the scraps in his slipsack in case he found a use for the resonance crystals later on. They also stripped the armor and weapons from each, loading them into Hannah’s slipsack since she had the greatest chance of escaping to the Hell Hotel once they detonated their traps. Space in the extra-dimensional storage was getting thin, so they were relieved to find the Ossari all carried slipsacks of their own. Harvey found no resistance connecting to them as he had with the conduits, and found them to be mostly empty, other than a few books he couldn’t read, herbs he didn’t recognize, and random odds and ends.

  Each did contain a large bottle of gray powder, and Harvey pulled it out to inspect, since it seemed important enough to warrant a large supply for each Ossari.

  Harvey rushed to return the bottle to a pouch, worried any accidental contact could cost him a finger. Dissolving bodies and storing their power inside the bones was a harrowing thought, and he was suddenly acutely aware of his own skeleton hiding beneath his skin.

  Harvey quickly combined all the Undead’s belongings into a single slipsack, placed all the bodies in a second, and then handed one of the remaining three empty ones to each of them. In minutes, the clearing looked just as it had before, other than the addition of a new crater courtesy of Harvey’s spectral hammer.

  “How long do you think we have before more show up?” Hannah asked, running her fingers along the sinewy string of her new bone bow. She’d hesitated to use it, but couldn’t ignore the fact that it was an F Grade weapon and a significant upgrade over her old infantry bow.

  “No idea, those bats that found us are still out there somewhere. For now, let’s rest while we can,” Julian said.